Forum:Talk bubble policy

Forums: Index > Rin's Travel Agency > Archive > Talk bubble policy

		Catuse says at 08:09, July 5, 2012 (UTC)—I have no wish to change the world, but I do have a wish to change this policy (which doesn't actually exist) "Somewhere a zealous god threads these strings between the clouds and the earth, preparing for a symphony it fears impossible to play. And so it threads on, and on, delaying the raise of the conductor's baton."
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		Keltainentoukokuu - OH YEAH AWESOME TALK - Keltainentoukokuu 13:17, July 5, 2012 (UTC)
		I hate having lots of different policies, having something on every little thing, the less policies the better really. I get that if someone has a terrible talk bubble then you have more ground to stand on to complain about it if you have a set of rules to refer to, plus it seems less personal. But on other hand...omg who cares. Make a black bubble with black text for all I care. ;)

		Tia-Lewise - Tread lightly, she is near, under the snow. Speak gently, she can hear the daisies grow TALK - Summoner of Nyan 13:57, July 5, 2012 (UTC)
		Speaking as a non-moderator (that has, albeit, been here long enough to understand our policies on things), I think we might end up intimidating new users if they come here, all, "Oh, I've made a new account, let's see now- oh I have to conform to all this stuff, well that sucks." What I've found is most people ask other users to make talk bubbles for them if they don't know how themselves, and the users making them will know what kills your eyes and what doesn't, so they'll tinker with it in relation to that. If you really deem it necessary to enforce something concerning talk bubbles, they sort of go hand in hand with signatures, if there's a page about signature policy that isn't that cluttered forum, could it go in there?

I thought about writing a policy yesterday but didn't for one very good reason: How the hell am I supposed to be telling people to make templates in userspace when 99% of them are not?

As for rules: "name" field must be your username; talk templates used in public talkpages and forums must display your username or an acceptable variation.

That's probably it. I'd also make a comment about using the main template to make it easier for global maintenance. Images being 60px doesn't matter anymore. The left margin must be 67px. You can have your image at a 100px width, but if it infringes on the text in the talk bubble then it can be classed as unreadable. 79.69.196.27 14:17, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

Oh, and our signature policy is -->Project:Signature Policy<-- 79.69.196.27 14:19, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

less rules pls --Shockstorm 15:44, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

These rules are already in place, it's just a matter of writing them down. I.e: Templates not using the name parameter correctly will be changed, unreadable templates will be changed, templates not using the correct margin will be changed. This all REGARDLESS of making an easy to see and find policy page. JBed 15:45, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

I know, I just wanted to bug Cat with my bad grammar (running joke). I guess I would agree with Tia and Kelt that we don't need more policy pages, but either way it isn't a big deal. --Shockstorm 15:48, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

I hope all these instructions are in the "how to make your talk bubble correctly" page, wherever that is. So you can find them if you need. Help pages are just...more palatable than policy pages. Like in the sig discussion there was an idea that a sig should be X centimetres long, but just imagine yourself going round the wiki with a little ruler in hand measuring-- I mean come on. I agree on readable talk bubbles but please no "your shades must be such and such hexadecimal code apart to be considered readable" rules, or any stupid stuff like that. But if the help page on talk bubbles isn't good it should be improved.Keltainentoukokuu 16:27, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

		Deadlyslashsword - +It takes disaster to learn a lesson, but you're going to make it through the darkest nights+ TALK - 16:43, July 5, 2012 (UTC) - Some people betray and cause treason...we're gonna make everything alright.
		Yes, we have had this discussion before. There's no great need for a policy, just for common sense. Allow us to cite a policy whenever somebody makes a completely unreadable talk bubble without them going "Waaaahhhh! The staff members are power abusing meanies! I'm telling on you to Wikia!" or something just as annoying. Not saying it will happen, but can't hurt to try to avoid that. If a user can't handle us telling them that they need to change their bubble because we can't read it, that's their problem and frankly they need to get off of wikia because they don't work well with others. In my experience (as someone who has been asked to change their bubble in the early years and have seen it happen to others) most people are pretty chill about it. tl;dr: As long as the name or some recognizable variance of it is on the template and the colors aren't eye-scorching, then that takes care of the vast majority of this minor issue. Also, as someone who does have 14 different talk bubbles, I reserve my right to be indecisive.

I think that what Catuse said falls under common sense (the image size is coded on the template, so there's no need to discuss it), and I really don't think we need a policy for that, or next we'll be planning policies for usernames and writing a code of Final Fantasy Wiki etiquette. - Henryacores^ 16:49, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

There is a common-sense policy for usernames (offensive; masquerading; overly long (GODKING OF ICE CERBERUS WERE-GARURUMON))

I don't really understand why people don't like policy pages.

They help a wiki run more smoothly because there's always something to refer to that gives the proper way to do something.

It helps a wiki run more smoothly. JBed 17:10, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

Well what are you going to do if someone joins with an offending username? Ban them? :p Just curious.Keltainentoukokuu 17:48, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

It is on the offenses list and it has been done. JBed 18:37, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

		Catuse says at 18:20, July 5, 2012 (UTC) "Somewhere a zealous god threads these strings between the clouds and the earth, preparing for a symphony it fears impossible to play. And so it threads on, and on, delaying the raise of the conductor's baton."
		Alright, sounds fine with me, was just throwing that out there in case somebody thought it was a good idea as well. Shockstorm: 1337 sp33k is soooo ann0y1ng rite?!! ...let's hope Yuan and her fellow Grammar Nazis don't see this thread. :P Kelt: Help:FAQ#Talk Bubbles. Though some of it doesn't really make sense: The rules can be avoided if the talk template is being used for private use on a userpage, a walkthrough, or a special forum. As soon as a template that breaches any of the rules is used in a public place (including your own talk page) the template will be edited to meet guidelines. That page What is this "special forum"? And "as soon as" usually means a few hours later, and after a discussion on the user's talk page.

Special forums refer to Roleplay forums. JBed 18:38, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

		Jeppo TALK - 18:48, July 5, 2012 (UTC)
		All we really need is two rules: Make sure you've got a name and timestamp on it somewhere, and make sure it's readable, especially for colourblind people and people with difficulties with contrasts (like me). Anything else doesn't matter really.

... And the margin must be 67 pixels and the name parameter must be your username and the template must be at a sensible pagename. JBed 19:16, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

That sounds acceptable. It's a no-brainer, really. Except for the colour blind bit, how are you supposed to cater for the needs of everyone with some form of impairment? It wouldn't be fair on a user if another said to them, "I can't see blue, change the blue on your bubble." You get where I'm going with this. EDIT- Wait...yeah, that made no sense. But try and understand where I'm coming from. :P Tia-Lewise 20:53, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

People don't just not see a colour... like it becomes transparent on the background or something. Colour blindness has people see colours as different colours. Red/green has people confuse the two (I'm not colourblind, but I know someone who was, and I'm fairly sure that's how it is).

But in the end if you can make a tweak to your talk bubble that will allow it to be readable to more people, why not? If we had a regular user who had problems reading a talkbubble, wouldn't it be fairer to spare them the annoyance? (Although I added CSS classes on purpose so people who do have these problems can avoid it... which if we had a proper place to talk about talkboxes we would mention) JBed 21:02, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

I was being vague. My mum has blue/green colour blindness herself. Regular users, yes, I understand, but not the odd person who just pops up every now and then demanding change NOW. Tia-Lewise 21:14, July 5, 2012 (UTC)

		Shockstorm TALK - 00:08, July 6, 2012 (UTC)
		Actually, I'd support the idea of a policy page, simply because we have lots of written and unwritten rules scattered around, so it would be more efficient for new users to look at just 1 page. Of course, this could also just be added to the Talk Template page. Also, it should be made clearer that you can have multiple bubbles, but you just can't link all them to the Template page (unless I'm misunderstanding something). I say that since I just made mine, which gives me a different perspective I spose~. And yes Cat, tiz truly un4tunat. ttyl lol